I haven’t really paid much attention to Cindy Sheehan’s story; while I give credence to the fact that she is a bereft mother, her actions have been a bit too public for my taste. The fact that everyone turned her into some sort of mascot, and in turn, she has turned her son into one, doesn’t make it easy for me to give a lot of time to this story without getting mildly pissed off.

I am not, however, going to spend too much time piling up on her: for one (as Jeff Goldstein so well notes), anyone who tries to criticize her is left open for villification as a callous bastard who tramples on the feelings of a grieving mother. So I quote:

Apparently, any “wingnut” who dares analyze the political or cultural effects of Cindy Sheehan’s protests—whether his interest lies with how those protests are being covered in the media, or the possible political and personal motivations behind those protests, or the makeup of the attendant support and supporters of said protests, etc.—is an angry, black-souled, moronic, evil, vile hater who, in the words of one passionate Cindyphile in the comments here, “should slit [his] own throat.”

In other words, “How dare you! Cindy lost her son!” has, in short order, become the new “RACIST” or “HOMOPHOBE” of progressive poltico speak—a loaded signifier whose power rests in its refusal to allow for any but a single signification, a way for leftwing ideologues to strangle debate in the crib and to prevent any discussion on the practical affects of Sheehan’s carefully-orchestrated and increasingly-well funded anti-war media blitz by turning those very questions into an indictment of the questioner.

In short: any but a particular politically-sanctioned use of Cindy Sheehan’s narrative has become, in effect, hate speech.

The material quoted above is riddled with good links to check out. She has become the Holy Mother, the way Max Cleland has become (for quite some time now) the Holy Cripple: invulnerable to criticism by way of the accidents, or incidents, of their fate.

Whom to rightly blame for the deaths of our family members in Iraq is beyond debate: the ones who have killed them are responsible. The American Left has a fixation on ascribing everything good out of Bush’s actions to anyone and anything but Bush himself, while the blame for everything bad lays squarely on him.

Of those family members who have lost family in Iraq, the ones who are in support of this military action grieve silently, and take solace in the choices that these adults have made for themselves. They weep for loss and yet are proud of the choices their children, spouses, or parents have made. I have been reading about counter protests, although I will not give credence to the tone with which the DKos writer characterized those who came.

Truth be told, it is a lot to ask of the silently grieving and proud bereft to go to Crawford and partake in the same media basking that Ms. Sheehan is doing, just to give a decent, and silent counterexample. It is a lot to ask of them to bear the condescension of those who think that they have bought into the administration’s lies. It is a lot to ask of them to bear the brutal patronizing that comes with quotes like, “your child sacrificed himself for nothing,” or perhaps, “you worship the death of your son like it were such a sacrifice.” Of course made-up quotes like these are simply made-up; I wonder if any of those who have gone in counterprotest have heard something like that. As a matter of strategy it is a lot to ask, and yet there are those in support of the administration’s decision to go to Iraq, ones who have lost family members, who have gone and tried to show Ms. Sheehan a different perspective.

Both sides have accused each other of using people as mascots with which to club the other side into submission, and and Ms. Sheehan is no different. Of course, what she has done is her own choice, and she is not so much “exploited” by the media as she has established a professional relationship with them. A commenter at TalkLeft, from the same post by Goldstein that I cited, says:

The mothers will end it. It really is that simple. They won’t go away. From now on, wherever Bush goes he will be trailed by MOTHERS.

The American people will be happy to give money to democratize Iraq, or weapons, or other forms of support. They will not give their children. Fact.

Mothers, too, proud despite their loss will trail these mothers and show the president their support. And mind you, our families are not forcing minors into conscription. (It is without a doubt that there are those who enlisted in the Armed Forces for reasons less altruistic than that which we ascribe to most. There are those who have enlisted during peacetime before 9/11 for the benefits and never thought that they would go to war. Despite this fact they made that choice as adults, understood the implications of their enlistment and not majority of them have cut and run. For some, surely, out of fear of prosecution, but for many, for reasons all their own.) Our children are not being taken from our homes and forced into conscription. And, in the most telltale sign of how some among the American Left consider adult citizens, they see them as always and forever, children.

Whether Sheehan has changed her story or not (link thanks to Flap), her story as far as I am concerned is no longer a matter of a grieving mom who wants to meet with the President. She got what she wanted, and whether she wants to abuse the good will and grace of the president by mischaracterizing her visit, it is her choice and she will live with the consequences of it.

Finally, a few short notes on civility and how we discuss this topic. Issues like these tend to bring out the worst in people. Matt Stinson takes note of one who tends to be quite abusive in his tone towards Michelle Malkin, while Arthur Silber engages in a brilliant exercise in irony (I wouldn’t call it hypocrisy; I doubt I have been abusive in this writeup.). First he states as a lede:

Very briefly, here is the background that a lot of people seem to be unwilling to acknowledge. For the last several years, the national discussion about Iraq has been almost entirely dominated by the administration and its supporters. Beginning almost immediately after 9/11, anyone who dared to disagree with or even question Bush’s foreign policy decisions has been labeled as being “on the other side,” as being “objectively pro-terrorist,” and the like. In short: anyone who disagreed, no matter how well-grounded his objections and no matter how completely his objections have been vindicated by events of the last two years, was called a traitor. This is not a minor matter, and this is the cultural swamp in which we now live.

Later on in his post, he concludes:

At the end of the day, here is the difference in the two positions: Bush’s foreign policy is getting a whole lot of people killed and maimed. Not because Iraq represented a serious threat to us, which it didn’t; not because Iraq had meaningful ties to Al Qaeda, which it didn’t—but simply because Bush and his pals wanted their war. They wanted it long before 9/11, and they would have had it (or something like it) even if 9/11 had never happened.

Cindy Sheehan and those who support her want to stop the killing.

Still more briefly, here’s the choice:

Bush: a lot more killing for no legitimate or defensible reason.

Sheehan: an end to the senseless slaughter.

Is that even a contest for any decent, civilized human being?

Emphases and typographical niceties removed. For one who likes to cite false dichotomies in others, he sure knows how to slap one into the debate and freeze it. He calls the losses we incur and this military engagement senseless and, without proof (in situ) asserts the indefensibility and illegitimacy of Bush’s military actions (and demonizingly characterized as “killing,” as if Bush were a warlord in the league of Pol pot, Idi Amin, Robert Mugabe or a whole slew of other tyrants). Silber, like I’m sure many others out there, has become what he has grown to criticize so much. I’d take delicious delight in it had the circumstances not involve so much death, both senseless in some cases and honorable in most.